When did The Simpsons get bad?

[Coola Yagami]

Originally Posted by Leo656

Keep in mind, if it hadn't been stated before, Prowler's a few years younger than I am. He would have been too young to have experienced the anti-Simpsons hysteria. My wife is only one year younger than me, and she watched the show from the beginning but she completely missed all of the people being mad at it.

It was definitely a thing, but it came and went pretty fast and history doesn't really spend a lot of time on discussing the brief period where the show was "controversial". Most discussion about the history of the show only focuses on how it was an overnight sensation and changed TV forever and all that. They don't speak much of the year or so when Bart Simpson was every parent and teacher's worst enemy. Anyone who didn't see it up close as it was happening could be forgiven for not even knowing about it.

Especially since less than three years later, Beavis & Butt-Head came out and made The Simpsons seem positively quaint. That REALLY made parents and teachers feel foolish for ever being so uptight about The Simpsons of all things. They thought it was bad that suddenly kids were saying "damn" and "hell" because of Bart... and then they had to worry about their kids calling each other "butt-munch" and "dingleberry" and going around lighting fires.

If there was still any lingering "heat" on The Simpsons by 1993 among parents, teachers and churches... Beavis & Butt-Head pretty much put it all to bed immediately. But most people were done being mad at The Simpsons by then, anyway.

I remember an article or two complaining about Bart being an underachiever and proud or it, and the hell and damn and whatnot. I think the most dramatic example I personally experienced was the school banning people from wearing Bart Simpson shirts for a while.